3 young children pulled from burning Saginaw home, hospitalized

SAGINAW, MI —Three young children were pulled from their burning home in Saginaw and taken to the hospital for treatment of smoke inhalation, according to Saginaw fire officials and relatives of the victims at the scene.

Firefighters were called to a structure fire at the two-story house near the intersection of South Mason and Williams about 7 a.m. on Wednesday, May 15, according to Saginaw Fire Department Battalion Chief Steve Filary.

Naomi Velasquez, 25, lives in the home with her six children, according to her brother and neighbor, Jason Smith.

Smith said he awoke to the sound of breaking glass as Velasquez was breaking through the glass window of his back door to ask for help. As Smith came to his back door, he watched as firefighters pulled the three young children, two twin boys about 1 year old and a 3-year-old boy, out of the burning house next door.

Their bodies were covered in black soot, he said while holding back emotions and pacing around on the porch of his home, talking on his phone.

Filary said the firefighters who rescued the children believe they were not burned by fire but they instead suffered smoke inhalation.

A neighbor, Ira Grant, said he watched as the children were carried from the house to an ambulance and taken away. Grant was coming home from dropping his son off at school when he saw the fire.

"It went up quick," he said, noting he first saw smoke coming from the southwest side of the home before he watched flames coming out of a window on the northeast side of the house.

Two other children, ages 3 and 5, escaped from the home safely along with their mother, Smith said, and they are now safe inside his home. Velasquez's other son was staying with his father at a different location at the time of the blaze, Smith said.

Family members gathered at the scene and were planning to go to the hospital. They did not know the condition of the three children.

After the rescue, firefighters used hoses hooked to hydrants to soak the flames and ventilated smoke from the house using large fans.

"The fire was in the living room, we were able to knock it down quick," Filary said.

Deputy Fire Marshal Ralph Martin was at the scene to begin an investigation.